10 @ 10

In general I like big photos and designs that cover the whole page, however I also love seeing layouts like Allison Waken's and Anna-Maria Wolniak's, where small photos are enhanced by layered papers, painting, stamping and aparent random elements which are all combined together beautifully.

Inspired by them, I tried something a little bit different from my usual style.

I stamped, inked, used bits of post-it notes, washi tape and tracing papers.

I made a list of ten items and asked my daughtr to choose the favourite of each (movie, food, song, friend, etc).

Portraits

Every week I decide that in the next one, I'll definitely take a photo a day. Then I get distracted and don't. It is very frustrating specially as it is completely under my control.
But as I sat down to look at last week's photos, I realised that at least I took some photos - and some of then are actually ok. Not perfect, but ok.

I like this spot in the kitchen, with a big window in front, but I noticed that the oposite side was dark so to remedy it I persuaded my son to hold a big white card to act as a reflector. Of course, being who he is, he wouldn't hold it right and it got in the photo and I had to edit it out.

Sigh. I have two children. One is cooperative and the other is not. Won't be the model and won't be the assistant either...

10 years

Wednesday was a special day because 10 years before this girl joined our family. Lucky us.

Happy Adoption Day, L!

Don't Grow Too Fast...

Often I have an idea for a layout design which is very simple to visualize but a pain to make. Often I give up on those ideas.

This time, I would have given up if I didn't have the Silhouette. Or I would have attempted a digital layout. Because the idea was simple, layers of cardstock, going from light to dark, each with a word on top, but can you imagine handcutting all these letters?

These were the only shade I had enough to make the sentence I wanted. However would have been much better on a brighter pink.

I am not sure if you can see it, but he chevrons go from dark pink to while, you can see through all the shades.

Adventure and Rain

Last month my daughter went camping for the first time. It was supposed to be a 4-day/3-night trip, and you can't believe how much stuff she had to pack for that. Look at the size of her backpack! It rained to hard on the second night that they had to cut the trip short. Her sleeping back and PJs were soaking wet when she came how. Still, she loved the experience!

*Patterned Paper: Pink Paislee, My Mind's Eye, Crate Paper

*Stamp: Studio Calico

*Stickers: American Crafts for SC (letters), Cosmo Criket (small, rhs)

*Mist: Studio Calico

*Embossing Powder: American Crafts

*Ink: Versamark

*Digital Images: Ya Yeah Designs @ Two Peas in  a Bucket

*Punch: Woodware

The Moody Miss Journal cards by Ya Yeah designs were perfect for the layout!

Some layout and a birthday banner

I am trying to get the right balance between design and content in a layout. While I want to make things that are pleasing to the eye, what matters most is the content - the photos and the story. With that in mind, I am making an effort to add more journaling to my layouts. Or at least most of them. There's no harm in a fluffy, cute layout every now and them. Like having a calorie-full, vitamin-poor treat after a nourishing meal.

* Patterned Paper: Basic Grey (blue dots), My Mind's Eye (red and pink; red and white), Echo Park (yellow),  Pink Paislee (blue floral)

* Buttons: Crate Paper

* Fonts: Bebas Neue (title), Century Gothic (journaling)

* Tool: Silhouette Cameo

* Triangles shape: my own

This one is to be the cover page for 2011 project 12 (layout a month). The previous years' one was a labour of love, but 2011's is a quickie...

* Patterned Paper: Basic Grey

* Font: Bebas Neue
* Tool: Silhouette Cameo

 Inspired by this cool magazine illustration:

Source: houseind.com via Elisa on Pinterest

Two things I am using a lot: the Silhouette Cameo and the font Bebas Neue. Here's a birthday banner for my son, also using both of them:

*Fonts: Bebas Neue, Console Relay

*Tool: Silhouette Cameo

*Other: Cardstock, eyelets, twine

Not every exciting, but there are two things that might interest you if you have a Silhouette or Craft Robot. Notice the Happy Birthday on the first flag? If I had cut only the letters, I'd have to glue them one by one trying to keep everything aligned. I added a line above and below the letters, just touching them so the whole thing is in one piece. Very clever idea from Patricia Zapata - she has a freebie on her blog with the idea, but the format was not compatible with the Cameo so I made my own.

The other one is the Console Relay font - an interesting font and bit unusual.

one about the girl, one about the boy

I don't much use youtube, but definitely it has its use. My daughter wanted her hair braided into french plaits. Which I didn't know how to. After watching a couple of tutorial in youtube, I managed  to have her hair done.

This one is missing the title - I meant to superimpose "Tiddler" over "thing" on the die cut but didn't come round to do it.

The journaling says:

"Because you like to tell tales, I bought you a book about a little fish called Tiddler who always told tall lates. I think it backfired on me because you saw it as an encouragement.You told your teacher that I met President Obama when he visited Ireland.
You didn't think you'd get caught but you were.
Don't tell tales, Luke!"

I love it, not because of the design, but because it records something about my son, a historical event and also has my son's handwriting on it, I copied his school work and added to the layout. Sadly his grammar is not the best and I didn't think of asking him what he meant to wrote."

My little reader and March Summary

She loved that we read stories to her every night before going to bed. Since both her parents love to read too, I assumed that as soon as she became a proficient reader, she'd read books too.

But it wasn't the case, we'd buy books for her, go to the library with her. And occasionally, if we insisted, she'd read a book. One of the thin, silly ones, about fairies and the likes. It drove me insane, how could a girl with a pile of books to read say she was bored and had nothing to do? Surely, you have a BOOK??!!!

Then I found some books I thought she'd like, her goodmother gave her one. And she liked them. Then I bought her a book, the first from a series, to bring with her for our Easter break. She devoured it and we had to go to a bookshop to get the next one from the series. She finished it in one evening so the following day my husband got more 3. During the 5 day break she finished the whole series  but one which we couldn't find .

Going from one extreme to the other in a matter of months.

March's summary layout - I misted the border, I seem to be in a border phase. I think all of my recent layouts have a border, even if it is only implied like the one above, where I left a thin white border around the whole layout.

The pen sketched grid is a digi by Ali Edwards - very simple, one of the things I like about Ali Edwards is that most of what she does are simple and anyone could easily replicate (apart from her fabulous handwriting) but she has an eye to put things together that makes them special and original. I haven't put the list of supplies because I've been  lazy, but Ali's digi is available at Designer Digitals.

Have a good weekend!